Rock on.
Wednesday, September 30, 2020
Fun Stories
I never know how seriously to take Sherman's stuff in Vanity Fair, but it's entertaining!
According to the source close to the campaign, the Trump family is worried that Parscale could turn on them and cooperate with law enforcement about possible campaign finance violations. “The family is worried Brad will start talking,” the source said.
I Guess It's Funny
Though it's hard to laugh at any of this shit these days.
They made a list of more than 30 celebrities including Justin Timberlake, Taylor Swift and Billy Joel to appear in their ad campaign to "inspire hope" about coronavirus, but they ended up with only Dennis Quaid, CeCe Winans and Hasidic singer Shulem Lemmer.
The health department’s $300 million-plus, taxpayer-funded vehicle to boost confidence in President Donald Trump’s response to the pandemic is sputtering. Celebrities are refusing to participate, and staff are arraying against it. Some complain of the unstated aim of helping Trump’s re-election. Others point to an ill-prepared video team and a 22-year-old political appointee who has repeatedly asserted control despite having no public health expertise, according to six people with close knowledge of the campaign and documents related to its operations.
Just Provoking The Libs
That fucking newspaper.
In case you're wondering how we got to this place in history, here's an actual 2018 headline pic.twitter.com/BNYj46Iv9E
— Parker Molloy (@ParkerMolloy) September 30, 2020
Donald Trump Missed A Tremendous Opportunity To Denounce Donald Trump
Really shocked that he didn't. Hard to figure out.
Brian Kilmeade: "Donald Trump ruined the biggest layup in the history of debates by not condemning white supremists. I don't know if he didn't hear it, but he's gotta clarify that right away. ... Why the president didn't just knock it out of the park, I'm not sure." pic.twitter.com/Qo52jBDTPl
— Bobby Lewis (@revrrlewis) September 30, 2020
Foreclosing On The Mouse's House
Because I am super smart (many people have said so) I knew that whatever Covid aid there was wasn't enough, and certainly not for long enough. I suppose the Fed can prop up zombie companies and rich people for a long time, but it doesn't do much for most people.
New York (CNN Business)Disney is laying off 28,000 people in the United States as the coronavirus pandemic hammers its parks and resorts business.
The cuts will affect the Disney's Parks, Experiences and Products unit. The company said 67% of the employees laid off will be part-time workers.
Disney's parks and resorts division has more than 100,000 US employees.
Tuesday, September 29, 2020
Go!
Keep an eye out for the gaffes and zingers. Who has the worst gaffes? Who has the best zingers?
I am a political pundit.
I am a political pundit.
Sneak Attack
Amazing the sneaky stuff you can do if you want!
GOP had no one on the floor to object. The bill will fail due to filibuster but Schumer still successful forcing health care vote before election
— Burgess Everett (@burgessev) September 29, 2020
Happy Hour Thread
Debate night when it's obvious that if we want to treat politics as theater, then we should hire some theater critics to be political pundits, and not the other way around.
That Fucking Newspaper
Good journalism happens there, but their "personalities," the White House Gossip desk and the ones who hang out in cable news green rooms, will never ever get off their bullshit.
I could feel it coming the entire episode but still threw my phone when it came: @nytimes reporter on The Daily saying Trump’s personal debts are the same as how he ran the federal government, racking up deficits that we’ll be “paying for in years to come.”
— Sam Adler-Bell (@SamAdlerBell) September 29, 2020
America's Mayor
On Fox & Friends, Rudy Giuliani says Joe Biden "has dementia. There's no doubt about it. I've talked to doctors. ... The president's quite right to say maybe he's taken adderall." The hosts get visibly uncomfortable. pic.twitter.com/2Ma7DKNBpS
— Bobby Lewis (@revrrlewis) September 29, 2020
Great Tyranny, Lay Thou Thy Basis Sure
Just what does gold toilet man need a Scottish golf course for?
This time period coincided with a major spending spree by the Trump Organisation. Indeed, in November 2008, as a global recession hit, the then Trump Organisation executive vice-president, George Sorial, told The Scotsman that Mr Trump had £1bn “sitting in the bank and ready to go” to finance his course in Aberdeenshire.
But The Scotsman later revealed that a month beforehand, Mr Trump wrote personally to a Bank of Scotland executive, asking the institution for a 15-year £23m mortgage and a construction loan of £15m in order to buy Hamilton Hall in St Andrews and turn it into a hotel. The bank refused, and the deal never came off, though that scarcely matters. What is important is Mr Trump repeatedly pursued external financing, despite the claims Mr Sorial would go on to make.
Parscale
One thing about the Twitter is it always reveals the level of sympathy journalists extend - and expect the rest of the country to extend - to people they broadly consider to be in their club.
As a Wall Street Exec who gets 10 years for stealing all the pensions (hey it could happen) is not the poster child for sentencing reform, I don't think a rage-fueled intoxicated accused wife beating asshole with a giant gun collection who gets carted away after possibly expressing suicidal thoughts is the appropriate guy to inspire a sudden public concern for mental illness sufferers. As they say in other contexts, he was no angel.
But, hey, he's in the club.
As a Wall Street Exec who gets 10 years for stealing all the pensions (hey it could happen) is not the poster child for sentencing reform, I don't think a rage-fueled intoxicated accused wife beating asshole with a giant gun collection who gets carted away after possibly expressing suicidal thoughts is the appropriate guy to inspire a sudden public concern for mental illness sufferers. As they say in other contexts, he was no angel.
But, hey, he's in the club.
Debate Day
I hope Sleepy Joe gets a GIANT SHOT OF UPPERS IN HIS ASS.
I've spent a few years trying to point out that the Bush years were both as horrific and absurd as the Trump years, not to defend Trump but to rail against the failure to notice at the time and more disturbingly the amnesia from people who knew better once upon a time.
Both parts are important. They were horrific - people do remember at least parts of that - and hilariously, ridiculously, disturbingly absurd. They were evil and completely ridiculous. A lot of the "this is not NORMAL!" stuff comes from people who forget just what our sainted 4th estate, and that fucking newspaper, treated as absolutely normal back then.
Not that it's a competition, but I do admit the Trumpkins are lapping them...
I've spent a few years trying to point out that the Bush years were both as horrific and absurd as the Trump years, not to defend Trump but to rail against the failure to notice at the time and more disturbingly the amnesia from people who knew better once upon a time.
Both parts are important. They were horrific - people do remember at least parts of that - and hilariously, ridiculously, disturbingly absurd. They were evil and completely ridiculous. A lot of the "this is not NORMAL!" stuff comes from people who forget just what our sainted 4th estate, and that fucking newspaper, treated as absolutely normal back then.
Not that it's a competition, but I do admit the Trumpkins are lapping them...
Monday, September 28, 2020
How To Spend My Twilight Years
Rush is sick and not young and this is how he's choosing to spend his time.
People just can't get off their bullshit.
People just can't get off their bullshit.
Better
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi tells @mitchellreports the NYT expose on Trump's tax returns presents a national security issue: "He has exposure to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. To whom? The public has a right to know."
— Geoff Bennett (@GeoffRBennett) September 28, 2020
I think "not really rich" and "in debt to shady characters" is a better sell than "stickin' it to the tax man, baby." Though I don't think the last one is so bad either!
Get your investigators investigating!!!
Tears of a Nazi
So sad.
CONCORD, NEW HAMPSHIRE — Christopher Cantwell, the neo-Nazi podcaster charged by federal prosecutors with threatening to rape a rival neo-Nazi’s wife has been found guilty of extortion and threats. Jurors acquitted Cantwell of cyberstalking.
Doinking
The full story might be told one day, but it's apparent that the only thing that kept the Trumpkins from stealing literally all the money was that they were too damn stupid. They kept running their amateur grifts when they could just turn the Treasury over and shake all the money out of it. But they get closer and closer to figuring that out, and in term 2 they will just take it all.
Sharpie Accounting
The debate seems to be: either Trump is the worst businessman in history or he's a tax cheat, but the answer my friends, as it often is, is both.
Important to remember that what rich people get away with isn't necessarily legal, and that buried under a haze of regulations and loopholes and creative accounting there is a actually a bright line between "aggressive deductions" and "fraud."
I'm no smart tax law talking dude, but the obvious one seems to be "paying employee Ivanka as a consultant, also, too," though I'm guessing generally "making up all the numbers without even trying very hard" is probably a general theme.
Important to remember that what rich people get away with isn't necessarily legal, and that buried under a haze of regulations and loopholes and creative accounting there is a actually a bright line between "aggressive deductions" and "fraud."
I'm no smart tax law talking dude, but the obvious one seems to be "paying employee Ivanka as a consultant, also, too," though I'm guessing generally "making up all the numbers without even trying very hard" is probably a general theme.
Sunday, September 27, 2020
Big Story In That Fucking Newspaper
I always assumed Trump hid his taxes not so much for the corruption (stickin' it to the IRS, man!), but because how does gold toilet man explain losing money for years.
In fact, those public filings offer a distorted picture of his financial state, since they simply report revenue, not profit. In 2018, for example, Mr. Trump announced in his disclosure that he had made at least $434.9 million. The tax records deliver a very different portrait of his bottom line: $47.4 million in losses.tl;dr the dude hasn't paid any taxes for years.
Out Where The Lightning Splits The Sea
Maybe it's just that Other People puzzle me generally, but I have never really understood the motivations of your more-ambitious-than-average Dem member of Congress. The ones who stay in office forever without being entirely invisible, yet don't seem to be all that interested in accomplishing much, or doing a good job for their local constituents (a respectable option). As a stepping stone, sure, but at some point don't you cash out? Isn't some highly paid barely-show influence peddling job preferable to being a 12 term do-not-much House member?
Not talking about anyone in particular, just a general type.
Not talking about anyone in particular, just a general type.
Dealing With Rona
I think we know what needs to be done, even if imperfectly, at this point, though how to do it when 20% of the country and 40% of the governors would be in revolt if Dictator Biden tried to institute anything sensibly at this point is a bit of a mystery.
Can quibble about the precise *policies* and their degree of/method of enforcement, but basically... Wear masks as much as possible, certainly indoors anywhere but your home. Shut the bars and restaurants. Have everyone maintaining distancing as much as possible. No large gatherings.
no medium size gatherings. Test as much as possible. When cases are low enough have a full test/track/trace program.
Provide financial support to everyone. I mean everyone. Not "everyone affected." Just throw out money. You can tax it back later.
The tricky bits are schools/universities, I admit. Not a small issue...
Can quibble about the precise *policies* and their degree of/method of enforcement, but basically... Wear masks as much as possible, certainly indoors anywhere but your home. Shut the bars and restaurants. Have everyone maintaining distancing as much as possible. No large gatherings.
no medium size gatherings. Test as much as possible. When cases are low enough have a full test/track/trace program.
Provide financial support to everyone. I mean everyone. Not "everyone affected." Just throw out money. You can tax it back later.
The tricky bits are schools/universities, I admit. Not a small issue...
Poll Porn
Just something to keep us going.
CBS News poll:
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) September 27, 2020
North Carolina Senate: Likely voters
Cal Cunningham (D) 48%
Thom Tillis (R) 38%
President Biden Failing To Win Over These Ohio Diner Patrons
I suppose there are plenty of things to be mad about right now, so I shouldn't waste my beautiful mind imagining future things to get mad about, but you know Trump voters are going to be centered in political coverage going forward no matter what happens..
Sunday, Sunday
That they're running with "the party that nominated the Catholic guy and that guy was Vice President too and whose most powerful current elected member is Catholic is, actually, anti-Catholic" is evidence the Right knows, "ah, who gives a fuck, we can say anything, the Objective Journalists will just run with it."
Saturday, September 26, 2020
Meanwhile
I remain somewhat aghast that in the middle of all this most influential people can't get off their bullshit for just 5 seconds.
I suppose I'm just babbling here a bit, but the weird tension that exists among the authoritarian conservatives in this country is that for all their fantasies about what the country should be, most of them are pretty damn happy with the status quo. I mean, they'll miss the Applebee's when it's gone. Or The Palm, for the fancier ones. "Be careful what you wish for" doesn't really require some elaborate Monkey's Paw scenario to make the point. What they wish for is going to suck pretty hard in a fairly straightforward fashion.
I suppose I'm just babbling here a bit, but the weird tension that exists among the authoritarian conservatives in this country is that for all their fantasies about what the country should be, most of them are pretty damn happy with the status quo. I mean, they'll miss the Applebee's when it's gone. Or The Palm, for the fancier ones. "Be careful what you wish for" doesn't really require some elaborate Monkey's Paw scenario to make the point. What they wish for is going to suck pretty hard in a fairly straightforward fashion.
Barrett
As always, the Dem strategy will be to create some moment when All Good People must rise up and say ENOUGH and the GOP Daddies and the celestial hall monitors and the Marshall of the Supreme Court will declare that she must withdraw her nomination. And then be puzzled when it doesn't work.
If they try that hard.
If they try that hard.
Objective Journalism
It isn't the actions of a sentient land area, it's the Republicans in Pennsylvania who are doing this but "lol stupid Pennsyvania" is the sort of Objective Journalism we're used to from that fucking newspaper.
See, Pennsylvania, it’s not so hard: Iowa instructs election officials processing absentee ballots to place naked ballots in a secrecy envelope - not discard the ballots. https://t.co/bLxg2Ml027
— Trip Gabriel (@tripgabriel) September 26, 2020
Booby
Here's my full exchange with Bob Woodward during #IRE20 about him not consulting medical professionals after interviewing the President plus the ethics of waiting to publish the information about the President's much earlier knowledge about Covid-19: https://t.co/amNGThc4VJ
— Doomscrolling Reminder Lady at #IRE20 (@karenkho) September 25, 2020
Friday, September 25, 2020
New Cases In Last 7 Days Per 100,000
Florida is actually doing better than many states, coming in 24th with 87.
Top 5 states:
Top 5 states:
North Dakota 358Some of the larger European countries:
South Dakota 273
Wisconsin 243
Utah 203
Oklahoma 200
Spain 167I don't know what every country is doing precisely, but generally with cases that high, even the UK's 52, they are shifting towards harsher lockdown measures, not relaxing them as Florida is, and public mask wearing is required to varying degrees many places.
Czechia 131
France 122
Belgium 95
...
UK 52
...
Italy 18.8
It's Never Going To End
Florida has improved, but they're still doing worse (based on average new cases adjusted for population) than most European countries, which are having "oh shit time to panic" second waves, and stronger and stronger lockdown measures, generally.
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. – Gov. Ron DeSantis announced Friday afternoon that Florida will move into Phase 3 of reopening, a move that will roll back many of the restrictions put in place over the last six months of the coronavirus pandemic.
All statewide restrictions on bars and restaurants will be removed and it orders a right to work and operate a business so local governments cannot close businesses. Local governments can still limit or regulate the operations in some ways relating to COVID-19.
Kids Have Corona Symptoms About Every Other Week
Without even getting into the relevant discussion about child care and general available (not) support systems, of course parents are sending "symptomatic" kids to school. Maybe it's reasonable (if a bit overly hopeful) to expect that parents aren't sending kids that have tested positive, but the idea that they'd definitely pull their kids at every hint of a cough is absurd.
There's a bit of a slip in this article, in that "knowingly sending their children who have coronavirus" is not the same as "deliberately sending their sick or symptomatic child to school," but...
Parents are knowingly sending their children who have coronavirus back to classes in Wisconsin, health officials said on Thursday, which could lead to potential school district shutdowns.
“The health department has worked with school districts since spring to make a plan to reopen,” Kirsten Johnson, Washington-Ozaukee public health director, told NBC News. “Never in a million years did we imagine or think to account for parents deliberately sending their sick or symptomatic child to school.”
There's a bit of a slip in this article, in that "knowingly sending their children who have coronavirus" is not the same as "deliberately sending their sick or symptomatic child to school," but...
Democrats
This is precisely the way it will be covered when the libs are herded into the death camps.
Republicans can no longer truthfully deny that Trump may be unwilling to leave office in the event he is defeated. And Democrats must now confront the possibility they may not have the power to stop him. https://t.co/JISMpSqEHK
— POLITICO (@politico) September 25, 2020
Almost Famous
For no particular reason, or maybe obvious reasons, I was reminded of this from a million years ago.
Russert gave the game away, it was "famous" but only "famous" in the US among the press corps, and some very online weirdos who read fine blogs like this one, who famously managed to not give it any coverage at all. Nice trick!
The memo was leaked this year to the Times of London, which printed it on May 1. The story, coming on the eve of Blair's reelection, generated extensive press coverage in Britain. In setting up his question to Mehlman on Sunday, Russert said, "Let me turn to the now famous Downing Street memo" (emphasis added).Later, after essentially not covering it for weeks, it was covered as "old news," or the justification for not covering it was that it was old news.
Famous? It would be famous in America if the D.C. press corps functioned the way it's supposed to. Russert's June 5 reference, five weeks after the story broke, represented the first time NBC News had even mentioned the document or the controversy surrounding it. In fact, Russert's query was the first time any of the network news divisions addressed the issue seriously. In an age of instant communications, the American mainstream media has taken an exceedingly long time -- as if news of the memo had traveled by vessel across the Atlantic Ocean -- to report on the leaked document. Nor has it considered its grave implications -- namely, that President Bush lied to the American people and Congress during the run-up to the war with Iraq when he insisted over and over again that war was his administration's last option.
Russert gave the game away, it was "famous" but only "famous" in the US among the press corps, and some very online weirdos who read fine blogs like this one, who famously managed to not give it any coverage at all. Nice trick!
And The Snuffy Walden Music Swells!!!!!!
Unsurprisingly, Sorkin has West Wing Brain.
Sorkin, whose films often deal with the ethics of power, ended the conversation by revealing how he would write election night, 2020. “Trump does what we all assume he will do, which is not concede defeat, claiming the election’s rigged and the Democrats cheated. For the first time, his Republican enablers march up to the White House and say Donald it’s time to go. I would write the ending where everyone does the right thing. I don’t think Trump will do the right thing, except by accident.”
Thursday, September 24, 2020
Poll Porn
Foxy ones.
NEW Fox News Polls:
— Pat Ward (@WardDPatrick) September 24, 2020
NEVADA
Biden 52%
Trump 41%
OHIO
Biden 50%
Trump 45%
PENNSYLVANIA
Biden 51%
Trump 44%
He's Not Smart Enough To Be A Racist
Quite the take!
Several officials said that Trump is not a disciplined enough thinker to grasp the full dimensions of the white nationalist agenda, let alone embrace it.
Meritocracy
Just the way things work.
The state auditor’s office has confirmed that Richard Blum was the UC regent who wrote “an inappropriate letter of support” that helped admit a student to UC Berkeley that was among dozens of improper admissions identified in a scathing state audit released this week.
Blum, a financier and husband of U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-San Francisco), told The Chronicle Thursday that he’s been writing such letters for years and “no one ever told me it was wrong.” He said he has contacted the chancellors at multiple UC campuses over the years.
SIrrah
https://t.co/gFpmS1SINB https://t.co/nMuRDAAIeu pic.twitter.com/wfffLNx6Qu
— Parker Molloy (@ParkerMolloy) September 24, 2020
I WILL FIGHT FOR YOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU
Electeds ask for a lot. They require your vote, for one, which is why I find it pretty offensive when it is commonly implied that the problem is that they are powerless because people just didn't bother to vote. Especially post-2018, when they did and made Pelosi Speaker. I suppose I could bring up 2008 when they were given the keys to the kingdom. People voted.
Small donor money from people who can't afford it, or could certainly spend the money on booze or other entertainment instead. Volunteer time from people who don't have it, or could certainly spend more time with their kids, or drinking that booze, or whatever.
And the truth is that not-very-ambitious members of Congress in safe-ish seats don't have to work very hard, and most of them don't, and the kind of "work" they often do isn't really the kind of work the time-and-money-they-don't-have givers want them to be doing
That's fine, really, even in times like these. You don't need 300 fighters, but you need 30 and for most of the rest to at least stay out of their way. If the people at the top aren't up for the fight, they can get out of the way, at least for a moment.
I don't expect to have much fight when I'm 87. I doubt it occurred to me until I was about 40 that I might be alive at 87.
I definitely don't plan to be a US Senator. It is a job that comes with obligations, especially if you insist on keeping things like important chairmanships just because. At 87 I hope I don't have many of those.
DiFi is just an example. It's a broader issue.
Small donor money from people who can't afford it, or could certainly spend the money on booze or other entertainment instead. Volunteer time from people who don't have it, or could certainly spend more time with their kids, or drinking that booze, or whatever.
And the truth is that not-very-ambitious members of Congress in safe-ish seats don't have to work very hard, and most of them don't, and the kind of "work" they often do isn't really the kind of work the time-and-money-they-don't-have givers want them to be doing
That's fine, really, even in times like these. You don't need 300 fighters, but you need 30 and for most of the rest to at least stay out of their way. If the people at the top aren't up for the fight, they can get out of the way, at least for a moment.
I don't expect to have much fight when I'm 87. I doubt it occurred to me until I was about 40 that I might be alive at 87.
I definitely don't plan to be a US Senator. It is a job that comes with obligations, especially if you insist on keeping things like important chairmanships just because. At 87 I hope I don't have many of those.
DiFi is just an example. It's a broader issue.
What's A Uhaul Cost, Michael?
Most of the time you can walk in and get one for 20 bucks. Glad the Real American Whisperers think this is some sort of extreme exotic expense.
The political right is obsessed with this U-Haul rental truck tonight, as if renting a local one for the day would cost more than $100 tops https://t.co/OYDIH0xcDZ
— Jared Holt (@jaredlholt) September 24, 2020
What Are You Going To Do About It
House (supposedly) has the power of the purse, any Senator can waste two hours just by raising his/her hand at the right moment,...
#TheResistance loves to say "this isn't normal," but the people we put in power are acting like it is.
#TheResistance loves to say "this isn't normal," but the people we put in power are acting like it is.
The Referees!
And just for reference pic.twitter.com/DwElKukB2p
— Jamison Foser (@jamisonfoser) September 24, 2020
The New York Times ran its story on Trump refusing to commit to a peaceful transfer of power on page A15, Washington Post on A4. Can't tell if or where they ran stories but it isn't on the Newseum's front pages for Wall Street Journal, LA Times, USA Today, or Chicago Tribune. pic.twitter.com/NVPMFcb6cd
— Matthew Gertz (@MattGertz) September 24, 2020
Thursday Is New Jobless Day
870K new lucky duckies.
Peak new claims in the Great Recession was 665K. Every weekly report since March 26 has been higher than that.
Peak new claims in the Great Recession was 665K. Every weekly report since March 26 has been higher than that.
Wednesday, September 23, 2020
Wave 3
Not that we ever really quite got past wave 1, but in any case shout out to all the anti-mask politicians who helped to make it happen.
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — Missouri Gov. Mike Parson, a Republican who has steadfastly refused to require residents to wear masks, tested positive for the coronavirus, his office said Wednesday.
Parson was tested after his wife, Teresa, tested positive earlier in the day. Teresa Parson had experienced mild symptoms, including a cough and nasal congestion, spokeswoman Kelli Jones said. She took a rapid test that came back positive and was awaiting a nasal swab test to confirm the finding.
Eject Before It's Too Late For The Rehabilitation Tour
If ever you're wondering which Trumpkins will survive with the reputations intact and cable news gigs and other lucrative opportunities endlessly available, the answer is "all of them, Jethro."
(CNN)Once a fixture at the administration's coronavirus briefings, Dr. Deborah Birx has confided to aides and friends that she has become so unhappy with what she sees as her diminished role as coordinator of the White House coronavirus task force that she is not certain how much longer she can serve in her position, sources familiar with her thinking tell CNN.Easiest for the ones who have been feeding journalists their concerns OFF THE RECORD the whole time, but all of them will be fine no matter what.
Birx has told people around her that she is "distressed" with the direction of the task force, describing the situation inside the nation's response to the coronavirus as nightmarish.
Just Gotta Laugh
NEW YORK JUDGE ORDERS ERIC TRUMP TO APPEAR FOR DEPOSITION BY OCT. 7 IN CONNECTION WITH CIVIL PROBE BY NEW YORK ATTORNEY GENERAL -- COURT HEARING
— *Walter Bloomberg (@DeItaOne) September 23, 2020
Poll Porn
#NEW @CNBC/@ChangePolls:
— Political Polls (@PpollingNumbers) September 23, 2020
MI:
Biden 51% (+2 in 2 weeks)
Trump 43% (-)
WI:
Biden 51% (+1)
Trump 42% (-2)
AZ:
Biden 49% (-)
Trump 43% (-2)
PA:
Biden 49% (-1)
Trump 45% (-1)
FL:
Biden 49% (-)
Trump 46% (-)
NC:
Biden 48% (-1)
Trump 46% (-1)
Well What Are You Going To Do About It
Those of us who lived through 2000 know that the press will just treat the day to day developments as equally valid competing legal claims, with the balance of bias leaning towards the powerful, as always.
And the judges, well, [gestures]. There are no referees coming to save us.
Trump may test this. According to sources in the Republican Party at the state and national levels, the Trump campaign is discussing contingency plans to bypass election results and appoint loyal electors in battleground states where Republicans hold the legislative majority. With a justification based on claims of rampant fraud, Trump would ask state legislators to set aside the popular vote and exercise their power to choose a slate of electors directly. The longer Trump succeeds in keeping the vote count in doubt, the more pressure legislators will feel to act before the safe-harbor deadline expires."To a modern democratic sensibility." Well, yes, very modern.
To a modern democratic sensibility, discarding the popular vote for partisan gain looks uncomfortably like a coup, whatever license may be found for it in law. Would Republicans find that position disturbing enough to resist? Would they cede the election before resorting to such a ploy? Trump’s base would exact a high price for that betrayal, and by this point party officials would be invested in a narrative of fraud.
And the judges, well, [gestures]. There are no referees coming to save us.
Finally Gonna Catch That Car
I do think the lack of empathy among conservatives explains much of what they think they want. The simple version is the "didn't think the Leopards Eating People's Faces Party would eat my face" joke, but the consequences of the fascist conservatarian dream policy are more complex than that, and the leopard doesn't have to come for your face for it to be a pretty big bummer for almost everyone involved.
Failsons All The Way Down
It's one thing to have failsons in charge of things. Let the Hapsburgs wear the crowns. Useless nobles can still be capable of surrounding themselves with people who are not useless. But when the failsons start surrounding themselves with failsons and those failsons start surrounding themselves with failsons...
There's (somewhat sadly) genuine value in being well-connected and, as Jared says, being able to "pound the phones." Inevitable, and to some degree "being connected" is something that can be cultivated and not simply inherited. But what happens when the people you call are as useless as you? And the people they call are as useless as them? And none of them are capable of understanding that some people might not be as useless as they are? They bought their way into Harvard, after all. You didn't!
Just as an example, it's one thing to absurdly overpay government money to your pals to provide PPE in the middle of a pandemic. Corrupt, though a bit of it is just how things are always going to work and the system can reasonably tolerate a lot of it. It's quite another to hand them lots of money and not even get the PPE.
Just an example, as I said. Apply it across the board to, well, everything. And it isn't just Trump or Republicans or the government.
There's (somewhat sadly) genuine value in being well-connected and, as Jared says, being able to "pound the phones." Inevitable, and to some degree "being connected" is something that can be cultivated and not simply inherited. But what happens when the people you call are as useless as you? And the people they call are as useless as them? And none of them are capable of understanding that some people might not be as useless as they are? They bought their way into Harvard, after all. You didn't!
Just as an example, it's one thing to absurdly overpay government money to your pals to provide PPE in the middle of a pandemic. Corrupt, though a bit of it is just how things are always going to work and the system can reasonably tolerate a lot of it. It's quite another to hand them lots of money and not even get the PPE.
Just an example, as I said. Apply it across the board to, well, everything. And it isn't just Trump or Republicans or the government.
Tuesday, September 22, 2020
Terf Wars
This interview with Judith Butler is good.
JB: Let us be clear that the debate here is not between feminists and trans activists. There are trans-affirmative feminists, and many trans people are also committed feminists. So one clear problem is the framing that acts as if the debate is between feminists and trans people. It is not. One reason to militate against this framing is because trans activism is linked to queer activism and to feminist legacies that remain very alive today. Feminism has always been committed to the proposition that the social meanings of what it is to be a man or a woman are not yet settled. We tell histories about what it meant to be a woman at a certain time and place, and we track the transformation of those categories over time.(her answers are good, the interviewer is dumb)
We depend on gender as a historical category, and that means we do not yet know all the ways it may come to signify, and we are open to new understandings of its social meanings. It would be a disaster for feminism to return either to a strictly biological understanding of gender or to reduce social conduct to a body part or to impose fearful fantasies, their own anxieties, on trans women... Their abiding and very real sense of gender ought to be recognised socially and publicly as a relatively simple matter of according another human dignity. The trans-exclusionary radical feminist position attacks the dignity of trans people.
Looters
The Pentagon is just black pit of corruption and defense contractors hide behind The Troops, especially post-9/11, so people are scared to criticize them and Congress loves to give them even more money then they ask for because everyone in Northern Virginia needs a new boat.
A $1 billion fund Congress gave the Pentagon in March to build up the country’s supplies of medical equipment has instead been mostly funneled to defense contractors and used to make things such as jet engine parts, body armor and dress uniforms.
THE NORMS
I suppose I mock the concept a bit here, because too often THE NORMS that concern our sainted senators are pretty silly. Nobody outside of the club thinks the silly rituals are important in and of themselves, and when senators go on about THE WORLD'S GREATEST DELIBERATIVE BODY, eye rolling is both the standard and appropriate response.
Still some basic level of trust does matter. Not BIPARTISANSHIP for its own sake, not compromise for its own sake, not teary tributes to the fact that tipnronnie had beers, but basic lubrication for the gears of discussion.
Still some basic level of trust does matter. Not BIPARTISANSHIP for its own sake, not compromise for its own sake, not teary tributes to the fact that tipnronnie had beers, but basic lubrication for the gears of discussion.
Well What Are You Going To Do About It
It is always a fair question to ask of our notional representatives, and while the realistic answer might often be "nothing that is likely to succeed," the realistic answer is rarely "nothing that has any chance of succeeding." There is usually value in the right losing fight, also, too.
Life Is A Tire Swing
Love objective journalism.
During GOP policy retreats, Boehner would gather reporters for a happy hour where he would tell us stories, razz us and shoot the shit about politics and life. It was terrific. If this book is anything like that, it’ll be fascinating https://t.co/iPTwCilX1W
— Jake Sherman (@JakeSherman) September 22, 2020
Nobody Knows This But
The extreme difficulty of scaling production of new technology is not well understood. It’s 1000% to 10,000% harder than making a few prototypes. The machine that makes the machine is vastly harder than the machine itself.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 22, 2020
Also, Elon's been selling "full self driving" since... 2016.
Good analysis, although I think we should wait until FSD is a bit more mature
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 21, 2020
And promised one million robotaxis by the end of 2020 and strongly implied the tesla network "turn your expensive car into a taxi for reasons" would be ready by mid 2021.
Gotta keep up with my hobbies, even now.
Monday, September 21, 2020
FREE SPEECH
What Kelsey misses is that what the "free speech" crowd objects to is protests. They're rude interruptions of the powerful and the favored by members of lower castes.
Absolutely infuriating that, while the Brave Defenders Of Free Speech have spent the last, oh, decade worrying about what troll gets uninvited from a speaking gig at Oberlin, Republicans have been passing law that make vehicular manslaughter okay if it only kills protestors. https://t.co/rK17tkAsJI
— Kelsey D. Atherton (@AthertonKD) September 21, 2020
Remember When We Were Young
To better visualize observed data, we also continually update a curve-fitting exercise to summarize COVID-19's observed trajectory. Particularly with irregular data, curve fitting can improve data visualization. As shown, IHME's mortality curves have matched the data fairly well. pic.twitter.com/NtJcOdA98R
— CEA (@WhiteHouseCEA) May 5, 2020
Larry Kudlow Claims US Has 'Regained Control of the Virus' https://t.co/v97KVzSInQ
— Mediaite (@Mediaite) September 21, 2020
They're Bad People, Brent
The fiction maintained for decades was that Liberals and Conservatives both wanted (mostly) the same things but they had different ideas about how to achieve them. Jack Kemp and Paul Ryan cared just as much about elevating poor people as any (good) Democrat! You can wallow in nostalgia for an imagined past if you like, but let's at least be real about the present. They are assholes. Just bad people.
Have any of your Republican colleagues ever reached out, publicly or privately, and said the use of violent imagery or language toward you is not OK? No. There are really no dissenters. We have now had a few death threats that have been very publicized where people have been arrested and are incarcerated for it. I can’t remember a public statement or private comment of support.
Really? No Republican member of the House or Senate has ever offered any words of support? Nope.
We'll Know Better Next Time
The strategy of waiting for GOP Daddies or other external referees to save us is not one that has a very good track record.
Electeds with power gotta use it, not outsource it and hope for the best.
Electeds with power gotta use it, not outsource it and hope for the best.
And Who Cares If There Are A Couple
At this point any "good Republican" - even ones whose politics I find repulsive but who have a tiny shred of human decency - would leave the party, in effect if not in name, at least. Trump is a monster and 200,000 people have died and 95% of them absolutely fucking love it and why do you need bipartisan validation from these monsters just so you can hear Snuffy Walden songs as you walk and talk down the hallways.
Democrats should start contemplating the fact that there will never be a single GOP vote to fix any of the structures that make this possible. Like it or not, it’s entirely on them. No sense in courting anyone for months. Do it right off the bat—or don’t, and admit failure. https://t.co/5Rl11HC21L
— Brian Beutler (@brianbeutler) September 21, 2020
They Will
I know this is public performance, whatever its value or Biden's actual thoughts, but you can't appeal to the better nature of people who don't have any.
They will follow their consciences and that will not lead to a good result!
Follow your conscience,' Biden urges Republicans as Trump pushes for supreme court nominee
They will follow their consciences and that will not lead to a good result!
Sunday, September 20, 2020
So Trump Gets Uppers In The Ass
It isn't even projection with him. He's literally incapable of imagining anything outside of himself and perhaps some things from 40 years ago that lodged in his melon.President Trump slams Joe Biden: "They gave him a big fat shot in the a-- and he comes out and for two hours he's better than ever before... We're going to ask for a drug test." pic.twitter.com/U5F3Nzntpp
— The Hill (@thehill) September 20, 2020
Shakespeare's Lawyers
Good lawyers are good at pursuing any completely bullshit argument they can if it'll help their "side." Fine for an adversial legal system, perhaps, but when employed in politics in the context of "both sides" journalism it means journalists give complete bullshit arguments equal weight to non-bullshit ones. As casual news consumers are supposed to trust the "paper," putting it in print grants bullshit a legitimacy it wouldn't necessarily have. If this reporter at this distinguished paper presents this argument as having merit, then it must!
And Up It Goes Again
The rough overly simple version is that the initial hotspots (New York area especially) were hit really badly, then did a good job of squashing the bug. Some re-opened too early and in stupid ways, and saw their cases go up again, while in MAGAland the rebellion against LOCKDOWN TYRANNY created new hotspots.
The first trough (first part of this graph) was not good enough, and not as good (adjusted for population) as the troughs European countries managed after their first big waves, but it was a success of sorts. Then the second wave, followed by a new effort even in MAGAland, and eventually cases started to fall again, but then more reopening and schools and universities and...
(source)
It's never going to end and your passport is useless.
The first trough (first part of this graph) was not good enough, and not as good (adjusted for population) as the troughs European countries managed after their first big waves, but it was a success of sorts. Then the second wave, followed by a new effort even in MAGAland, and eventually cases started to fall again, but then more reopening and schools and universities and...
(source)
It's never going to end and your passport is useless.
Been Saying It For Years
Democrats *could* be a party exclusively funded by small donors. The tech, enthusiasm, and means are all there. Big ideological donors could fund voter registration projects and such at will, nobody would stop them, but the party would be funded by people. It’s within reach. https://t.co/CaxwIkJC2q
— Ryan Grim (@ryangrim) September 19, 2020
This doesn't mean no rich people throw down the top contribution, but it does mean that a focus on small donor money would be sufficient. People court top donors in part because "they" want to run in the fields with top donors. These are complicated transactional relationships.
I mean, forget politics - if your local opera house could fund itself primarily through small donors, would they? Again, maybe some rich people would throw down, but elite philanthropy is a world that exists to give a bunch of rich people something to do and a way to feel important, and gives people in the "fundraising world" opportunities to rub elbows with important rich people.
In politics, the rich donors have more that they want, and also more to give than just cash for candidates. These are mutually beneficial networking opportunities. Jobs and perks for everyone and access to the Treasury for the donors. A lot more than rubbing elbows.
They love the small donor money, but they love the rich important donors even more.
Sunday Funday
i like to periodically remember that "by 2017, the $100 note eclipsed the $1 to become the most widely distributed U.S. currency" and "as much as 80 percent of the 12 billion $100 bills in circulation live outside the country" https://t.co/zkQnLP0MCV
— 'Weird Alex' Pareene (@pareene) September 20, 2020
It is fun to think about. I am not smart but thinking back to old freshman economics about the functions of money the two big ones are "store of value" and "medium of exchange" and for normal people operating in the United States of America, the hundred dollar bill is not very useful as a medium of exchange. No, sir, not at all. Get the stink eye for using a $50 most places, even if they'll accept it. The kinds of normal retail establishments that will accept one hundreds are also the kinds of places one would expect people to use cards, generally. Most places that are happy to take a hundred are selling things that require many hundreds, such that even carrying hundreds is a bit inconvenient!
Sure there are some even surprising places where cash transactions (including dollars) are standard. And, yes, the kinds of black market (drugs) transactions that we are trained to understand as "black market transactions" but really this is a) massive hoarding of illicit cash b) massive hoarding of non-illicit cash c) massive use of cash for things we don't normally think of as "black market transactions." Those "all cash" real estate transactions are, in fact, all literal cash. It isn't isn't just a euphemism for no mortgage involved.
Saturday, September 19, 2020
Also, Chuck
He is the Minority Leader, but any senator can throw sand in the gears of the World's Greatest Deliberative Body even without whatever the "filibuster" is these days.
Power
A very frustrating thing about engaging on The Online Discourse over the past year and a half has been the resistance to the notion that the Speaker of the House has any power that she isn't choosing to use.
It is quite possible that the course she has plotted is the very best one. That's an argument to be made. Watchagonnadonothingtobedone is not an argument.
It is quite possible that the course she has plotted is the very best one. That's an argument to be made. Watchagonnadonothingtobedone is not an argument.
THIS IS THE LAST STRAW
I hope this is a promise, and not just lamenting the fact that the Senate gym won't be as pleasant until a couple of months from now when everyone has moved on.
If Republicans go forward and reverse the precedent they set in 2016, the Senate will never, ever be the same. It will be changed forever.
— Chris Murphy (@ChrisMurphyCT) September 19, 2020
I pray tonight that at least a few of my Republican colleagues understand this.
Use The Power You Have
I don't claim to know what the best ways to exercise power are, but I can list off a bunch of possibilities. So when the "oh well nothing we can do" excuses start, usually combined with "MR. MCCONNELL SIRRAH I BESEECH THOUETH TO DOETH THE RIGHTETH THING BECAUSE THE NORMS!!!!", know that it is bullshit.
Welp
The writers are just throwing everything into this season.
Don't think walking and talking is gonna be enough to get us out of this one.
Nor is turning it into a debate about whether Mitch McConnell is a big lying hypocrite (spoiler: he is) in order to get a ruling from the referees and and intervention from the hall monitors.
Friday, September 18, 2020
Trump Cards
I tire of lol Trump is dumb posts, but lol Trump is dumb.
The drug companies would spend $150 billion to address out-of-pocket consumer costs and would even pick up the bulk of the co-payments that older Americans shoulder in Medicare’s prescription drug program.
Then the agreement collapsed. The breaking point, according to four people familiar with the discussions: Mark Meadows, Mr. Trump’s chief of staff, insisted the drug makers pay for $100 cash cards that would be mailed to seniors before November — “Trump Cards,” some in the industry called them.
Not Hard
Without even getting into What "We"Should Have Known And When, I think it's pretty obvious now that what has to happen nationally, and certainly anywhere with rising cases is:
1) mandatory mask wearing
2) shut all unnecessary places where people gather and breath on each other without masks, like bars and restaurants.
3) anyone and everyone who can work from home should be encouraged to do so as much as possible
4) institute and maintain reasonable distancing protocols everywhere else
I think schools (and universities) especially are the tricky bit. Perhaps there is no good answer, but, well, nobody said a pandemic would be easy!
Obviously in my fantasy version everyone is given free money and "mandatory workers" are given even more money.
Also in my fantasy version there is universal on demand testing and a reasonable tracking system, as least once cases drop and that would be actually useful.
Disruptive, but not society destroying! Unlike, you know, a raging pandemic.
1) mandatory mask wearing
2) shut all unnecessary places where people gather and breath on each other without masks, like bars and restaurants.
3) anyone and everyone who can work from home should be encouraged to do so as much as possible
4) institute and maintain reasonable distancing protocols everywhere else
I think schools (and universities) especially are the tricky bit. Perhaps there is no good answer, but, well, nobody said a pandemic would be easy!
Obviously in my fantasy version everyone is given free money and "mandatory workers" are given even more money.
Also in my fantasy version there is universal on demand testing and a reasonable tracking system, as least once cases drop and that would be actually useful.
Disruptive, but not society destroying! Unlike, you know, a raging pandemic.
Time For Brunch
I don't like how old political hands are constantly invoking past elections and events as if they have established some iron clad rule about How Things Are, but still there are always lessons in the past, and one is that if you disband the people who do the work while the people at brunch sneer, there's no one to help you win that 2010 midterm election. Something like that, anyway. David Brooks doesn't do any phonebanking.
Can't BeIieve I'm Losing To This Guy
Biden isn't losing at the moment, or doesn't appear to be, and I'm not saying he will, but I do think that one answer to the question of how is Trump still so popular (he isn't, but 40% instead of 32% approval), is that the people you need to reach - people who are reachable - don't actually know about things like this. Not just the "wow Trump is gross" or "wow this Covid thing seems bad" or even "wow Trump's a big gross liar (like all politicians)" but the real corrupt shit and the real specific "policy" choices.
A heavily criticized recommendation from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention last month about who should be tested for the coronavirus was not written by C.D.C. scientists and was posted to the agency’s website despite their serious objections, according to several people familiar with the matter as well as internal documents obtained by The New York Times.
The guidance said it was not necessary to test people without symptoms of Covid-19 even if they had been exposed to the virus. It came at a time when public health experts were pushing for more testing rather than less, and administration officials told The Times that the document was a C.D.C. product and had been revised with input from the agency’s director, Dr. Robert Redfield.
Harvard's Finest
Truly a wonderful meritocracy.
The same attendee explained that although he believed in open markets, he feared that the system was breaking. As evidence, he pointed to a CNN report about New York governor Andrew Cuomo and his desperate call for supplies.His view of "the markets" is funny. You "pound the phones" with the unlimited budget of the federal government, just handing out checks to your friends until one of them maybe comes through.
“That’s the CNN bullshit,” Kushner snapped. “They lie.”
According to another attendee, Kushner then began to rail against the governor: “Cuomo didn’t pound the phones hard enough to get PPE for his state…. His people are going to suffer and that’s their problem.”
“That’s when I was like, We’re screwed,” the shocked attendee told Vanity Fair.
The group argued for invoking the Defense Production Act. “We were all saying, ‘Mr. Kushner, if you want to fix this problem for PPE and ventilators, there’s a path to do it, but you have to make a policy change,’” one person who attended the meeting recounted.
In response Kushner got “very aggressive,” the attendee recalled. “He kept invoking the markets” and told the group they “only understood how entrepreneurship works, but didn’t understand how government worked.”
Thursday, September 17, 2020
And He Was So Happy At CNN For Years
Always like to remind people that several Fox news people where happily employed at CNN (in this case Bill Hemmer), back when conservatives loved to call it the Communist News Network.
Disgusting People
Wow seems like Trump is bad!!!
At one coronavirus task force meeting, Troye claimed that Trump suggested "maybe this Covid thing is a good thing."
"I don't like shaking hands with people. I don't have to shake hands with these disgusting people," Troye claimed Trump said at the meeting.
Level Up
If he has round 2, Trump will have learned that he can do more than steal the couch quarters.
President Trump’s luxury properties have charged the U.S. government more than $1.1 million in private transactions since Trump took office — including for room rentals at his Bedminster, N.J., club this spring while it was closed for the coronavirus pandemic, new documents show.
The documents, including receipts and invoices from Trump’s businesses, were released by the Secret Service after The Washington Post filed a public-records lawsuit. They added $188,000 in previously unknown charges to The Post’s running total of payments to Trump’s properties related to the presence of Secret Service agents.
In Bedminster this spring, the records show, Trump’s club charged the Secret Service more than $21,800 to rent a cottage and other rooms while the club was closed and otherwise off-limits to guests. The documents don’t give a reason for these rentals. Trump didn’t visit the club while it was closed, but his eldest daughter, Ivanka Trump, and her family reportedly visited at least once.
Vaporware Or Malware
Are they making this up entirely, will they be injecting something damaging into people, will they line people up for shots of nothing, or will it just disappear like most everything else Trump promises.
"Having 100 million doses of an actual functioning vaccine by the end of October" is not actually on the list of options.
Chief of Staff Mark Meadows says WH aiming to have 100 million doses of Coronavirus vaccine ready to go by end of October. Says goal is to make the the most vulnerable and highest risk people are vaccinated in that first group. Says up to 300 million doses would be ready in Jan. pic.twitter.com/7YHttsd5au
— Mark Knoller (@markknoller) September 17, 2020
"Having 100 million doses of an actual functioning vaccine by the end of October" is not actually on the list of options.
Tyranny
Looking at the national case numbers slowly rise again, it's worth remembering that the best case scenario - President Biden in January - will be met with almost every Republican governor and Bürgermeister in open rebellion against any sensible public health measures. The Tea Party, but for wiping out the species.
And that's the best case scenario.
US is gonna be under global (mostly) quarantine for a long time.
He means bad slavery, which might affect white people, not the good slavery, which didn't and is missed.
And that's the best case scenario.
US is gonna be under global (mostly) quarantine for a long time.
While there’s no national lock down, Barr said: “You know, putting a national lock down, stay at home orders, is like house arrest. Other than slavery, which was a different kind of restraint, this is the greatest intrusion on civil liberties in American history.” https://t.co/M5Fmq1Y8Bw
— Manu Raju (@mkraju) September 17, 2020
He means bad slavery, which might affect white people, not the good slavery, which didn't and is missed.
Wednesday, September 16, 2020
It (Mostly) Isn't The Lies It's The Lying
I know I've been saying this for years, but the individual Trump lies are usually not important, it's the fact that he lies constantly. Instead of treating the president as the constant liar he is, each new statement is given the presumption of veracity, even if it is "fact checked" later. "The president said some dumb shit and it's probably not true but I suppose we'll check on it at some point" would be more informative journalism than repeating what he says.
Nobody Could Have Predicted
I tend to think a bit of this is too many people in the upper echelons of power everywhere just can't comprehend that there will be any consequences to their bad decisions.
Penn State’s total number of COVID-19 cases at University Park increased by 458 on Tuesday, boosting the total number of positives to 1,146.For them, there probably won't be!
We Know You're Wishing That We Go Away
I know it's rude to say so, but there are a lot of conservatives - prominent and otherwise - who really can't wait to go from Owning the Libs to Killing The Libs And/or Putting Them In Camps (But Killing is Cheaper!). Fortunately most of them aren't up to do the killing themselves, but...
Legitimacy
It was 20 years ago so nobody (except you, dear readers) remembers the 2000 election and post-election shenanigans. Probably some relevant and soon to be even more relevant lessons from then! One is don't count on the referees - the media - to, well, referee. They were unified with the Bush campaign line - even when it sometimes suddenly changed - the whole way. Why precisely that was is for the margin of this blog post, but trust me, it was.
More than that, they were unified with it before election day. There was a brief period when "conventional wisdom" was forming that the "unthinkable" might happen. Yes, that's right, that Al Gore would win the electoral college vote but lose the popular vote and proceed to steal the election by defying the will of the people and not promptly refusing to take office and demanding that his electors vote for Bush instead. For about a week "everybody" in the cable news green rooms agreed this would be the only possible way forward.
And then, well, that's not what happened...
More than that, they were unified with it before election day. There was a brief period when "conventional wisdom" was forming that the "unthinkable" might happen. Yes, that's right, that Al Gore would win the electoral college vote but lose the popular vote and proceed to steal the election by defying the will of the people and not promptly refusing to take office and demanding that his electors vote for Bush instead. For about a week "everybody" in the cable news green rooms agreed this would be the only possible way forward.
And then, well, that's not what happened...
3 or 4 Weeks
I suspect this is not happening.
And if you looked at what we’ve done with ventilators, and now, frankly, with vaccines --we’re very close to having the vaccine.
If you want to know the truth, the previous administration would have taken perhaps years to have a vaccine because of the FDA and all the approvals, and we’re within weeks of getting it. You know, could be three weeks, four weeks, but we think we have it. Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer, we have great companies and they're very, very close.
Tuesday, September 15, 2020
Negative Attention
Ok sure.
The health department's top spokesperson Michael Caputo called an emergency staff meeting on Tuesday to apologize for drawing negative attention to the Trump administration's health care strategy and signaled that he might be soon departing his role, according to five people with knowledge of the meeting."I am not Glenn Beck in different glasses," he added.
The departure of Caputo, who has closely controlled the health agencies' dissemination of information about coronavirus, would be a blow to the Trump administration's efforts to promote a possible vaccine, if one is approved in the fall.
Caputo told staffers that his series of false accusations on Facebook Live this weekend — which included unfounded allegations that the Centers for Disease Control was harboring a “resistance unit” — reflected poorly on HHS’ communications office. He blamed his recent behavior on a combination of physical health issues and the toll of fielding death threats against his family. Caputo also acknowledged that he had never read one of the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Reports, despite his team's ongoing efforts to try to edit those documents.
Always On Their Bullshit
I don't expect the current situation to cause everybody in the world to rethink their deeply held beliefs about everything, but I am struck how many people just can't get off their bullshit even for a few minutes. A bunch of the worst people in punditry actually went ahead with their plans to form the Journal Of The Existential Threat To America Caused By The Oberlin Student Council and The Cancel Culture of the Twitter Mob (if you don't know what I am talking about, you really don't need to know and your life is better than mine is).
Not expecting it to turn sinners into saints, or libertarians into socialists, or whatever, but "maybe put that bullshit aside for a couple of months" has genuinely been too much for many of our leading lights in the Hot Takes industry.
Not expecting it to turn sinners into saints, or libertarians into socialists, or whatever, but "maybe put that bullshit aside for a couple of months" has genuinely been too much for many of our leading lights in the Hot Takes industry.
Golly
Susan Collins gets concerned, Mitt unleashes a torrent of profanity ("oh heck"), and sometimes Murkowski is less than pleased, but otherwise there is not a single federal elected Republican who publicly breaks with anything Trump does (or privately in ways which matter, and no running to journalists to say things anonymously so you can point to it later does no count).
It's a disgrace. But there you are.
Nothing we can do about it.
It's a disgrace. But there you are.
Nothing we can do about it.
Monday, September 14, 2020
Drat! Foiled Again!
They mostly aren't that dumb (well, some are). They've just decided that after 3.5 years of almost 0 Trump announcements being even somewhat true, Proper Journalism requires them to report the next one as if it is.
Not sure what it's about, but informing people ain't it.
Not sure what it's about, but informing people ain't it.
Susan Collins Is Concerned
Hopefully the Good Republicans will save us from genocide.
Multiple women came forward to tell Project South about what they perceived to be the inordinate rate at which women in ICDC were subjected to hysterectomies – a surgical operation in which all or part of the uterus is removed. Additionally, many of the immigrant women who underwent the procedure were reportedly “confused” when asked to explain why they had the surgery, with one detainee likening their treatment to prisoners in concentration camps.
Betting It All On Black
No point in trying to micromanage the "win the election" strategy, and that is, at the moment, the only strategy, so there isn't even much point in wishing for another one. But there are deeper things which aren't just Trump or even one half of our political system (there are no good Republicans so stop saying that), and someone is going to have to start trying to explain that to The American People instead of simply complaining about Facebook or even the New York Fucking Times. You go to war with the media system you have, and perhaps it's time to start trying trying some different messaging strategies other than pointing out that Trump is bad and gross (he is) or getting David Brooks to write nice things about you.
Win or lose or whatever the inbetween thing is, the rot is deep and everywhere and there are lots of guns around.
Win or lose or whatever the inbetween thing is, the rot is deep and everywhere and there are lots of guns around.
Copaganda
I'd like to think that with the numerous instances - big and small - of cops just making things up and being contradicted by obvious evidence that the amount of unfiltered copaganda that news outlets willing to report, even when their own journalists are being beaten up, would be reduced. But lol NPR.
Each side has a story, who can say???
Here's Huang herself about All That.
While covering L.A. protests, journalist Josie Huang was tackled and arrested by several sheriff's deputies. Police say she didn't identify herself as a reporter and was interfering with a lawful arrest. KPCC says Huang was just documenting the arrest.https://t.co/4PANR2upfF
— NPR (@NPR) September 13, 2020
Each side has a story, who can say???
Here's Huang herself about All That.
Sunday, September 13, 2020
CMS Follies
Blogger keeps trying to push their new version on me and it is, unsurprisingly, worse and more confusing and more prone to make dumb stuff happen.
As far as I can tell it doesn't even claim to do anything better than the old system. It's just like "this new internet, man, gotta be big and bloated and more complicated and take longer and screw things up more because that's progress."
As far as I can tell it doesn't even claim to do anything better than the old system. It's just like "this new internet, man, gotta be big and bloated and more complicated and take longer and screw things up more because that's progress."
Passport To Nowhere
Given the basic if somewhat fluid criteria of the EU and elsewhere, and even an optimistic trajectory of COVID, that passport isn't going to be good for much for 4 months, minimum...
2020 is pretty weird!
2020 is pretty weird!
The Good Old Days
The catastrophic AQI levels we are experiencing in the west right now was just totally normal summertime air pollution levels in LA as recently as the mid 90s. https://t.co/VCDNNZYKry pic.twitter.com/emlHxj3A0q
— Wally Nowinski (@Nowooski) September 12, 2020
The point is not that the pollution is no big deal, it is that it used to be really really bad and then we somewhat fixed it.
Saturday, September 12, 2020
Who Is "We"
Not really picking on this column, but a constant tic from people who have large platforms and who have an ability to Influence The Discourse, is to say "we" when they mean "me and people like me" or when they should say, "people who have some power and influence who I could and should name."
We have lost something — the ability to expect recognizably adult, human behavior in our leader. Worse, we’ve also lost what we said we wouldn’t: the ability to feel disappointed and indignant when it does not come. There is an element of exhaustion here. Fury feels rote, less a feeling than the memory of one.
Is That A Lot?
Seems like a lot.
Now that stream feels like a flood. In just the past week, a New York Times survey has found, American colleges and universities have recorded more than 36,000 additional coronavirus cases, bringing the total of campus infections to 88,000 since the pandemic began.And they have two friends and they have two friends and...
Trump's Still Bad
I admit I'm surprised by the number (not infinite, but not trivial) of enthusiastic helpers he has whose motivation for doing so, other than a desire to buttress the fortunes of Dear Leader, is unclear, at least to me.
The health department’s politically appointed communications aides have demanded the right to review and seek changes to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s weekly scientific reports charting the progress of the coronavirus pandemic, in what officials characterized as an attempt to intimidate the reports’ authors and water down their communications to health professionals.Not that I approved of it, either, but I sorta got how dedicated Bushies were on board with their man, either due to pure venality or getting caught up in what was marketed as a sacred cause, a holy conflict (I guess people forget because nobody wants to remember how fucking insane they were back then). And, sure, Stephen Miller is in his best possible place for his holy cause. But most of the rest of them? I mean the ones who aren't just the Family Grifters.
In some cases, emails from communications aides to CDC Director Robert Redfield and other senior officials openly complained that the agency’s reports would undermine President Donald Trump's optimistic messages about the outbreak, according to emails reviewed by POLITICO and three people familiar with the situation.
Friday, September 11, 2020
What A Long Strange Trip It Was
I suppose I envy the people who don't remember the aughts very well, which seems to be most people. You had to be Very Online back then, I think, to really get the horrifying big picture, and most people were not Very Online. Stu Bykofsky (now retired) wrote this in 2007. It's utterly nuts but represents the era well.
What would sew us back together?
Another 9/11 attack.
The Golden Gate Bridge. Mount Rushmore. Chicago's Wrigley Field. The Philadelphia subway system. The U.S. is a target-rich environment for al Qaeda.
Is there any doubt they are planning to hit us again?
If it is to be, then let it be. It will take another attack on the homeland to quell the chattering of chipmunks and to restore America's righteous rage and singular purpose to prevail.
The unity brought by such an attack sadly won't last forever.
It Was A Long Time Ago
9/11 defined a decade, almost entirely for ill. People who lived through it seemed to have forgotten everything about it, and anyone under the age of 30 barely remembers, or at least cannot have any perspective on events which shaped the lives.
I mean, Let It Be came out in 1970 and Paul's Boutique came out in 1989, for some perspective.
I mean, Let It Be came out in 1970 and Paul's Boutique came out in 1989, for some perspective.
Also The Greatest Day In Donald Trump's Life
"Forty Wall Street...was, actually, before the World Trade Center, was the tallest. And then when they built the World Trade Center it became known as the second-tallest, and now it’s the tallest."
— Mehdi Hasan (@mehdirhasan) September 11, 2020
Trump speaking, on 9/11!, about a NYC building of his:pic.twitter.com/MXNrv6fz1a
Ah, Well, Nevertheless
One thing about being on The Left is you're right about a lot of things (not everything!) and the people who keep fucking up treat you with disdain and contempt.
...adding since it wasn't clear, that was from April and still no state and local gov't money!
Amid growing criticism from progressives and increased anxiety among the nation's working families, small business owners, and local and state governments that economic relief from the coronavirus pandemic will come too late and be too little, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Sunday told television viewers to "just calm down" when asked if she had erred in her legislative strategy with the Trump White House and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. Asked by CNN's Jake Tapper on "State of the Union" if she had made a "tactical mistake" by allowing an "interim" piece of coronavirus relief package—known as COVID 3.5—to pass last week without much stronger support for state and local governments, Pelosi deflected on the premise. "Just calm down," Pelosi said. "We will have state and local and we will have it in a significant way. It's no use going on to what might have been."As long as rich people are happy and stonks are up, Republicans don't give a fuck. "We" tried to tell them...
...adding since it wasn't clear, that was from April and still no state and local gov't money!
Happy Conservative Christmas!
The day older conservatives get to pretend to care about dead New Yorkers so they can enjoy their favorite pasttimes of hating liberals and Muslims!
Younger conservatives don't even remember. It was 19 years ago.
Thursday, September 10, 2020
Ah, Well, Nevertheless
Seemed like a good idea at the time.
MADISON (WKOW) -- UW-Madison reported nearly 400 new COVID-19 cases affiliated with its campus Thursday, a drastic increase that more than doubled the previous single-day total.
The university reported 295 on-campus tests that returned positive for COVID-19 and an additional 95 positive off-campus tests for a total 390 cases.
Sure Why Not
Thought Monsters, Inc. was trying to warn us.
The compound has become an object of fascination, however, among COVID-19-truthers and adherents of QAnon, the fringe, baseless theory that a well-sourced government agent called “Q” leaks top-secret intel about a global cabal of Democratic and Hollywood pedophiles through cryptic and grandiose messages known as “Q-drops.” The quasi-cult’s sway has grown considerably in recent years, thanks in part to the tacit encouragement of Donald Trump. On Tuesday, a QAnon promoter named Marjorie Taylor Greene won 57 percent of the vote in a Republican primary for Georgia’s 14th congressional district, all but ensuring her victory in November. “There’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to take this global cabal of Satan-worshiping pedophiles out, and I think we have the president to do it,” Greene once said in a video from 2017. Trump applauded Greene’s primary victory.
For conspiracy theorists, adrenochrome represents a mystical psychedelic favored by the global elites for drug-crazed satanic rites, derived from torturing children to harvest their oxidized hormonal fear—a kind of real-life staging of the Pixar movie Monsters, Inc. “QAnon also likes to say that Monsters, Inc. is Hollywood telling on itself,” says QAnon researcher Mike Rains, “because the plot of scaring kids to get energy is what they really do.”
Oh Dear
Time for another blogger ethics panel.
It's Susan Page, host of the forthcoming Harris-Pence debate.
As a young journo - I was so fearful of being seen as “bias” I wouldn’t even write a check to my local mosque at its annual fundraiser. (These were the post 9-11 years) And here you have a reporter hosting a lux “girls night” for a Trump official.
— Asma Khalid (@asmamk) September 10, 2020
That, my friends, is privilege https://t.co/XAsJeYUHh8
It's Susan Page, host of the forthcoming Harris-Pence debate.
Breakin' The Law
I've actually never figured out what the ultimate aims of the genuine hardcore "hard Brexiteers" are. I understand why all the dogs have enjoyed, and do continue to enjoy, chasing the car. It's been a lot of fun and very rewarding for them politically! Some would like to continue to chase the car forever!
But for the ones who really want to catch it... I really don't know.
But for the ones who really want to catch it... I really don't know.
The Answer Is: $600/week Would Be Proven To Be Fucking Amazing Policy
Out of curiosity, would you be in favor of a $600 a week supplement when the unemployment rate is 3.5%? And if not why not?
— Jason Furman (@jasonfurman) September 9, 2020
And if state computer systems could handle replacement rates what replacement rate would you set it at now? What would you have set it in April?
The argument against more generous benefits, such as it is, is that moochers on the superdole won't want to return to work. If we do have a superdole, and the unemployment rate is only 3.5%, a crazy low rate according to economists just a few years ago, then the superdole clearly wouldn't be discouraging people from going back to work.
Furman's been pushing to cut this since May. It's now been cut to nothing, of course.
Furman's one of the "good guys."
Furman's a rich real estate heir, whose career only makes sense if you understand that he's the child of very generous longtime party donors.
The Power of Positive Thinking
Others have written about this more, but basically Trump buys into this idea that you just will reality to go your way, and then if it doesn't you burn it all the fuck down and move on to the next thing. Given the way current events and The Discourse work, he can actually get away with it most of the time as president. Tweet through it and move on.
Covid just won't go away.
The Bushies weren't so different, really.
Covid just won't go away.
The Bushies weren't so different, really.
Wednesday, September 09, 2020
Ethical Journamalism
I know that the high priests of journalism have decreed that there is a sacred code, and that all agreements between source and reporter are of greater importance than, say, the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people, but there are many times in our lives when the right thing to do isn't strictly the "legal" thing or the "by the ETHICS code" thing. You know, civil disobedience.
I'd say when Booby Woodward, age 77, rich guy, is sitting in front of his TV for months watching Trump lie repeatedly and continuously about something he knew as the body count meter goes around and around, that the moral thing to do is to say "screw whatever agreement I had with my source! I'm going to violate TEH ETHICS and go to print now!"
Protecting whistleblowers, both individually and so as not to discourage future ones, is important. Protecting your ability to personally get future scoops from The President Of The United States of Plague Ridden America... not so much.
I'd say when Booby Woodward, age 77, rich guy, is sitting in front of his TV for months watching Trump lie repeatedly and continuously about something he knew as the body count meter goes around and around, that the moral thing to do is to say "screw whatever agreement I had with my source! I'm going to violate TEH ETHICS and go to print now!"
Protecting whistleblowers, both individually and so as not to discourage future ones, is important. Protecting your ability to personally get future scoops from The President Of The United States of Plague Ridden America... not so much.
It's About Ethics in Covid Journalism
Thumbsuckers about "journalistic ethics" rarely hit on what normal human beings would consider to be ethical questions.
so woodward had a taped interview from march where trump said that covid is much worse than the flu and that the official message about it was false, and he sat on it for six months, is that right
— flglmn (@flglmn) September 9, 2020
Thoughts and Prayers
Love these wimps.
Not gonna leap alone, Bob, so just gonna do some prayer performance and get you to write it down. Sally Quinn will be impressed.Jim Mattis quietly went to Washington National Cathedral to pray for the nation's fate under Trump's command and, according to Woodward, told Dan Coats, "There may come a time when we have to take collective action" since Trump is "dangerous. He's unfit." https://t.co/tJHANGbCeG
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) September 9, 2020
It's Never Going To End
Optimistically, President Biden takes office over 4 months from now and GOP state and local politicians become even more hostile to any sensible public health measures.
That Fucking Newspaper
The Loretta Lynch/Bill Clinton tarmac meeting "provoked a political furor" and may have "compromised the Justice Department’s politically sensitive investigation into Hillary Clinton’s email practices."
— Dan Lavoie (@djlavoie) September 9, 2020
Trump turning the DOJ into his personal libel attorney is an "unusual move." pic.twitter.com/VIS62wA5om
Tuesday, September 08, 2020
My Beautiful Bikers
Nobody could have predicted, yadda yadda.
Media reports last week showed that at least 12 states had reported cases connected to Sturgis. The number of people infected had surpassed 260, and the first known COVID-19 death from the event occurred in Minnesota last week.I will say it is a bit of East Coast Elitist disdain to pick on the Sturgis organizers and participants and enabling politicians, when universities and university administrators are doing Sturgis all over the country. With predictable results, also, too.
Given that the 10-day rally drew some 400,000 people, those numbers may not sound that bad. But epidemiologists say the actual number is likely much higher. Limited contact-tracing ability in some states is artificially reducing the case numbers, they say. Plus, there was a strong thread of disdain in the crowd for testing and other safety measures.